How To Properly Post [W/ Pics]

[ßetray]

How To Properly Post
by ßetray
Credit: listed at the end

Nearly 2 years ago, Treyska posted the following:

Recently, there has been a trend growing on MMOwned of posting threads that are of as little help as possible.

As of today, this seems more obvious than ever. I'd like to Re-introduce to the community to the ideals/principles
of providing solid information while displaying them in a clean & legible manner.

What will be covered in this thread:

*Originality
*Usefulness & Placement
*Content
*Styling

•Using the Post Tools

•Using tools outside the forum

*Credit / Sources



Originality

MMOwned forums have been having an excessive amount of threads created with content that,despite amazing
tools provided by the forums and warnings created by the Administration staff, is merely redundant.
I'm referring to the extremely annoying concept of a REPOST.

As much as everyone feels the need to post something out of necessity to not appear as a leecher or to benefit the
community, posting something that has already appeared on MMOwned.com creates several problems:
inproper credit, misplaced hostility, overflow of content, and more.

So, you have something you'd like to post on the MMOwned World of Warcraft Forums. Whether it be an Exploit,
Guide, Bot, Account, or other it is imperative that you take the proper steps to insure that this is an original post.

To begin, create a title for your topic that is generic. Example: you have an method/guide to make some fast money
by farming in Nagrand. So you type in "Fast Gold" and let the forums begin their process.

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The forum has generously searched itself for you and compiled a short list of possible topics that already list the
information you want to give. So skimming these topics is a good to make sure you're not duplicating information.
But just to be sure we're going to double check because it takes less 30 seconds to open a new MMOwned window and
use the Search Feature.
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Again, skimming through the topics quickly is a good idea.

So you've checked the background on your topic and found that you have something new to offer MMOwned.com.
FANTASTIC! Let's continue.



Usefulness

The idea of posting on MMOwned.com is to provide fellow World of Warcraft Players (Warhammer/AoC) with
information about the game that they do not yet know, and can benefit from. This, in turn, requires you[the poster] to
understand what you are actually posting and how it works.

What is your topic going to cover?:
Is it something that was not intended to work the way you made it? Sounds like an Exploit. Head over to the Exploits forum.
Is it something designed to make the life of a WoW player easier? Sounds like a Guide. Head over to the Guides forum.
Is it a new area? Sounds like Exploration.

In each Forum you will find a stick at the top the topics board labelled something similar to 'Section rules' or 'what to
post and not to post'. PAY ATTENTION TO THESE POSTS. They are here for EVERYONE's benefit. Sadly though it's because
people ignore these posts that I'm writing this.

Now, not all fun Tips, Tricks, & Easter Eggs belong in these sections. It is your job to figure out where your post belongs.


Content

No topic will reach its full potential without the proper inclusion of all needed information.

Topics SHOULD contain the following: [as much as possible/applicable/relevant]
•Patch Version
•Location
•Time Frame
•Technique
•Program(s) used
•Classes & Spec's used
•Route taken
•Money Spent / Money Made
•Pictures
•And More

The easier it is for others to understand/follow/duplicate what you posted, the better it is for both you and the
community. Proof reading is PRO.


Styling

People hate walls of text.
People hate pure caps.
People hate blinding colors.
People hate poor grammar and spelling.

Again borrowing from Treyska, "English is a fine language". Now I say that because this is a forum written in English,
not because I want to drop kick other languages. I'd say 9/10 people on these forums speak English as their native
language and .5/10 of the 1/10 who don't speak English as their first language understand it fairly well.
Speaking in a common understandable language makes communication easy. Do your best to write comprehensible
sentences. Lay out your ideas clearly.

Anyway, on to the aesthetics of posting.

Post Tools:

There is no set size for every monitor in the world. Therefore, be considerate when writing and posting pictures.
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These features are your friend. They provide with the ability to make a post more than just a post. Well no, I lied.
A post will always be a post, but with these tools, you are able to write in nice selection of clean fonts, a nice selection
of RGB colors, formatted text, bold, italics, underline and much more. Use these tools wisely. No one wants excessively
large eye-piercing yellow font.


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The Smilies selection offered on these forums is HUGE. Simple click on the [More] button and you will find what you're
looking for. Warning: Do NOT over use smilies. It's childish and ruins most posts.


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These images will be displayed on the left of your Thread in the forums. Use cautiously! The majority of posts on this forum
do not require any such icon. If you're posting in the exploits section, you really don't need to use the exploits icon. Bots
don't require the bots icon, guides don't require the guide icon, etc.


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Nearly everyone should be able to use the post creation the way it was designed. But should you need more BBCode or
HTML code acces, the editor mode button will allow you to see exactly what you're writing.

External Post Tools:
Screenshots[SS]: "A picture of a computer display that shows the content of the screen at a given point in time." - sait-fds.editme.com/Sssss

SS provides the community something to not only read, but begin to experiece what exactly he or she is discussing. To
take a SS in-game there are several methods, but I will discuss what I believe is the easiest.


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In-Game there is Screen Shot keybind that you can set. Mine is set to F12. Then to set the format of the screenshot
picture, type the following:

/console screenshotFormat jpg 
/console screenshotQuality 10

This will make sure that the format is set to .jpg and that the resolution is as best as WoW can take.

[Alternatively, you could hit PrintScrn on a PC and open Paint, hit Ctrl+V to paste the image and save it. On a Mac hit
Command(apple key)+Shift+3 for fullscreen SS or Command+Shift+4 to turn your mouse cursor into a selection tool to
designate what part of the screen you want to SS; it will auto make a .jpg image and place it on your desktop.]

Now for uploading the image, I suggest ImageShack® - Image Hosting They have an extremely user friendly free
interface. You can also register and have all your files you upload auto stored in a profile for you.

Note: When choosing the link to provide on the forums, first decide if it's too big. If it's fairly big, choosing the Thumbnail
for Forums is probably the better choice. Example:

URL=http://img192.imageshack.us/my.php?image=screenshot060109144227.jpg]IMG]http://img192.imageshack.us/img192/4784/screenshot060109144227.th.jpg[/IMG[/URL
 Note: I removed several brackets [] from the code so it would display the majority of the vode properly

Now normally
this would be fine, but I've noticed recently that people just suck at posting the proper image link. (no one wants the
link to the 2nd thumbnail). So, we are going to do so minor code editing to make the community get a direct link from
Thumbnail to Image. Copy the Direct Link url and paste it into the "[url=xxxxxxxxxxxxx][img]" where the x's are.


Video: The best way to post a video is merely grab the direct URL link from Youtube and paste it directly into the text.
Example:

yt]h*tp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxxxxxx[/yt

Will result in a video displayed in the thread for easy
viewing. Anyone can also click on the video to be take to the original source.

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So there you have it. I sincerely hope that this guide will help out many people and provide another reason no one should
post reposts/bad posts.
Remember, this is a community and we flourish when we're working together. Help others, discover new tricks, create
new guides, explore new regions.

"Everything will be all right in the end. If it's not all right, it's not the end."



Credit/Sources:
-The majority of my credit goes to Treyska who created his guide nearly 2 years ago. I used several of his ideas and
showed where they were used. If I missed any citation, please inform me.
-MMOnwed Admins/Mods who keep our boards rather clean.
-Everyone who provides awesome information to the forums
-Everyone who properly informs OT's when their thread is a repost AND provides repost links.
http://www.mmowned.com/forums/wow-gu...ent-guide.html
http://www.mmowned.com/forums/wow-gu...post-pics.html
http://www.mmowned.com/forums/wow-gu...t-section.html
Changing the screenshot format - WoWWiki - Your guide to the World of Warcraft

[[Blaze]]

You do realise you posted like 10 Rick Roll videos?

[ßetray]

You do realise you posted like 10 Rick Roll videos?

Yeah, the YT BBCode screwed up so I removed it. Thanks for the note tho.

[Thidan]

Move to general.
This has nothing to do with WoW itself
And don't you all go and flame me for stating the obvious.
Why?
Read the section headline:
WoW Guides - Gold making guides, leveling guides and skill gaining guides for World of Warcraft.

And no I'm not flaming, just saying that he should copy&paste the thread in the correct section.

[ßetray]

Edit: looks like it was moved anyway. Hope people will still read it even though most people who use the exploit/guide/etc forums don't stop by the general chat forums.

[Vindicated]

You forgot opportunity. The best times to post a thread to maximize your rep is on Friday mid-day if you are in US and Friday night for EU people. <3

[ßetray]

Was too lazy to post on friday and if I hadn't posted today I probably wouldn't have bothered the rest of the week lol